


show it to me in the little things

by spirrum



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Courtship, F/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-05
Updated: 2016-01-05
Packaged: 2018-05-11 19:49:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5639758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spirrum/pseuds/spirrum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She is delicate in her methods, and lovely in her quiet persistence.</p><p>***</p><p>For the prompt: "A shy Lavellan who wasn't bold enough to kiss him in the Fade decides to court Solas by sending complimentary messages and anonymous gifts (like tiny frilly cakes and wildflowers and tasty aromatic hot drinks that are not tea)"</p>
            </blockquote>





	show it to me in the little things

He is being courted.

It takes a while for him to notice; to put the pieces together. First there are gifts  _– edible_ gifts. Small, frilly cakes in colourful boxes with pretty bows; little bursts of frivolous beauty that delights him more than he’ll admit. Then one afternoon he returns from his walk to find a steaming mug sitting at the centre of his desk – hot apple cider that makes his mouth water. A cold, brittle evening a few days later, it’s mulled wine. But there’s no obvious culprit, and when he inquires with the kitchen staff, no one breathes a word.

At first he suspects Sera, but the treats have not been tampered with – there are no poisons, no bugs. Nothing that would suggest a practical joke. But he doesn’t touch the cakes, or the drinks – not at first, anyway, but then one day there is a cup of hot chocolate awaiting him, thick and sweet-smelling and topped with cream, and this time, he can’t resist.

He doesn’t mention the gifts to the others – doesn’t ask if they know who might be behind them, in case word should start to travel. Whoever is sending them appears to desire their anonymity, and so he keeps their existence to himself, these small indulgences that remind him a little of home, and a life where he could allow himself to enjoy small pleasures.

Then, there are notes. Written in an elegant pen but unsigned, they appear among his belongings – in his rucksack, on his desk, and even one tucked between the folds of his bedroll. A far better surprise than Sera’s lizards, and he spends an idle hour reading it under the glow of his mage-light while the rest of the camp sleeps.

It’s a poem. An amateur’s construction, there’s no distinctive pattern to the rhythm, but the words are heartfelt, and he keeps them with him as they trek across hills and plains, finding an odd respite in sounding out the words in his head. He wonders if the sender might be in their travelling party, but there are no more notes while they are away. It could have been someone at Skyhold, slipping it into his belongings before their departure, and he mulls over the thought, even as his eyes drift a few paces ahead, to the bounce of russet hair, and the trilling laughter that keeps drawing him out of his introspection. Because there are days he thinks the sender might be– but no, he doesn’t let his thoughts linger long on that, aware that it’s a dangerous path. Dangerous, because of the _hope_ that accompanies the idea, that she might harbour the sentiment he feels in the written words, and that _she_ –

He shakes the thought loose, but it’s an itch that won’t quite go away, and it stays with him long after they return to Skyhold, and the notes keep coming. These are not poems but short sentences – _I saw a flower in the garden today and thought of you. A sturdy stem and thick, green leaves. Most would call it simple, but there is beauty to be found in simplicity, I think._ The next note contains the same flower, lovingly pressed, and he tucks both note and flower between the pages of one of his books.

And there are more notes, as the weeks crawl by. Some contain simple descriptions, of the light filtering through the grand windows in the hall, or the herbs growing in the gardens – _I didn’t think anything could grow this far up the mountains_  – and a profound melancholy he feels in his bones – _sometimes I look at all these smiling people and I wonder if they smile in truth, or if they are like me, and smile for small things but cannot muster the happiness to be truly at peace. But I feel peace with you, and that is no small thing._

And he reads them and rereads them until he knows them all by heart, and there’s no doubt in his mind now that he is being _courted,_ thoroughly and skilfully, even before he wakes one morning to find a folded piece of paper sitting by his empty cup, bearing five simple words:

 _I want to kiss you_.

There is a surge in his chest, a swell of feelings he hasn’t felt in years ( _decades, centuries_ ), and he reads it over and over until it’s all he knows, and he can’t focus at all for the rest of the day, mind drifting back to the words – words that someone had penned, a daring move even in its anonymity.

And he knows, now, who the sender is. He knows it by the hesitance of the quill’s sharp tip, pressed against the paper just a little too long after _I want,_ to make the ink blot. He knows it in the breath he hears, the release of courage as the next three words follow suit, a hasty scribble compared to the careful control of the first two. And he’s seen her hesitate; has seen her perch on the precipice of a decision, before taking the plunge. He’s witnessed her thoughtfulness – the way she watches the troops, etching their faces into her memory, and keeping her thoughts (her fears and insecurities, _her desires_ ) to herself.

And him, he realizes, and though none of the notes bears her name, Solas feels it in every one of them as he plucks them from their hiding places now, to read them again, imagining her voice behind the words – _there is beauty to be found in simplicity. I feel peace with you._

_I want to kiss you._

He knows it’s her, and his hands are shaking, gripping the latest note. His desk holds a chaotic assortment of letters and flowers, and other little things she’d sent him – an eagle’s feather, and a small, smooth animal skull. A string of wooden beads with intricate inscriptions, to decorate his staff. A thin leather-bound book with blank pages, full of charcoal sketches now, and what would she think, Solas wonders, if she knew he’d filled the empty spaces with _her_?

Footsteps in the doorway then, and he looks up, but he doesn’t scramble to hide the scattering of notes and gifts from her sight. Instead he draws back, the note still held between his fingers, slightly crumpled, but it doesn’t matter.

“Hello,” Ellana says, and he sees her eyes drift to the contents on his desk; the heap of notes and trinkets, and the smile that stretches along her lips doesn’t leave a shred of doubt in his mind, although she hasn’t said the words.

And _is this to be your last?_ Solas thinks, because she has visited him before; has talked, of his travels and his stories, but this visit is different – _feels_ different, like she is there for him. Not his counsel or his tales, but him, and only that. And if she is, it’s a carefully planned move. From her expression, he suspects she is aware that he knows, but she cannot know for certain any more than he, and so she’s left herself open. Another folded note, its contents hidden. The choice to accept is still his.

She looks like she might say something else, but she’s barely had the chance to open her mouth when he covers the length of the room in five long strides, to take her face in his hands. The note drops from his fingers to drift towards the floor, but he has no mind for it, because all he can think about is _I want to kiss you._

And so he does.

He feels her intake of breath, a shudder against his lips, before she sinks into his embrace. Her hands fist in his tunic, and he has wanted this, oh he has _wanted_ this for months, imagining the lilt of her voice, wrapping lovingly around his ears; speaking words he’s read but never heard. He’s wanted to kiss her – to feel her beneath his hands the way she is now, the gentle press of her mouth and the tremble of her lip. And there are words on his tongue, too – notes never sent but that he’s kept with him, poems and observations and intimate little things, like the hours he’s spent sketching the curve of her jaw; the bow of her lips. Desperately intimate things, and he would tell her – _will_ tell her, the things he wants.  _I want…I want–_

“You,” Solas says, when he pulls back. Her eyes are large in her face, pupils wide and all-encompassing. “It is you.”

Ellana ducks her head, and he feels the brush of her cheeks against his palms, that terrible softness. “Is that good?” she asks, laughing and slightly out of breath. “Am I _–_?” but she doesn’t finish the question.

And he can’t bring himself to lie; can’t bring himself to tell her that though _she_ is good – the best thing he has found in this broken world of sleepwalkers – he is not. Not for her, in the long run, but –

But he can be good _to_ her, and he has wanted few things with quite the same fervour as the chance to cherish her the way she has cherished him, with her small gifts; her trinkets and her thoughts.

It might not be good – not for her, not for him, but it’s been so long since he’s known a devotion as strong as this; since he’s been drawn towards a single soul, realizing only too late that she’s become a focal point in his tumultuous existence. And so there’s no lie when he draws her close, to speak the truth against her brow in a lingering kiss, “You are _everything_.”

And when she smiles now – a toothy, deliriously happy smile – he knows something has changed, irrevocably. He thinks it might be the world, made a little more real with every one of her smiles, and every small kindness. Or perhaps it’s her, no longer the anonymous hand behind loving gestures, and a little less shy in her affections.

It will take him years yet– standing in a solitary office, bearing a name and mantle that should feel familiar but doesn’t, and plucking old notes out from where he’s kept them hidden, the paper worn and folded and the ink faded, but her words as striking as the first time he read them – to realize that the one who’s changed is him.

And this time he’s the one who pulls out quill and paper; who puts words to the conviction that burns in his chest, a fire fiercer than his regret, because it’s not too late to turn back, he knows, even as the tip of the quill stills against the paper, the ink blotting behind two, familiar words:

_I want_


End file.
